Officials warn of more disasters

By Luige A. del Puerto
Inquirer

UNLESS an early warning system is set up to advise people living in flood- and landslide-prone areas, a disaster similar to what took place in St. Bernard town in Southern Leyte province could hit the country's eastern seaboard again, the defense department warned yesterday.

"Over the next four months, there is the danger that this flooding and landslide will happen again ... These flood-prone and landslide-prone areas could be hit," Defense Secretary Avelino Cruz Jr. said.

The eastern seaboard refers to provinces that lie near the Philippine Sea and Pacific Ocean. They include Cagayan, Isabela, Quirino, Aurora, Quezon, the Bicol provinces, Samar and Leyte islands, Surigao and Agusan provinces and Davao Oriental.

Once La Niña comes, these areas would be the hardest hit, according to Dr. Graciano Yumul, chief of the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (PAGASA). La Niña is a weather phenomenon characterized by heavy rains.

In fact, in the next 24 hours, heavy rains brought by La Niña are expected to hit Davao Oriental, the Cotabato provinces and the Caraga region -- all in Mindanao, PAGASA said.

Without citing specific places, Cruz said landslides, in fact, had already been reported in other areas of the country.

Mapping

Cruz said the government had begun mapping out the towns prone to floods and landslides. Once the list is ready, he will ask the media to help disseminate the information.

Officials of the National Disaster Coordinating Council will also discuss the matter with governors, mayors and village chiefs.

The House committee on housing and urban development yesterday asked the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) to promptly publish the list of all landslide- and disaster-prone areas in the country to adequately forewarn the public.

Committee chair Representative Eduardo Zialcita of Parañaque said the Mines and Geosciences Bureau (MGB) of the DENR had come up with a landslide susceptibility map as early as 2004 but nothing was done to relay that information to local government units (LGUs).

Zialcita said the MGB report would be useful in the government's assessment of what had been done to educate LGUs about the map.

He lamented that the MGB had failed to issue the necessary warning to residents of St. Bernard and, thus, the catastrophic landslide that buried an entire village in the town.

Preventable

"The [MGB must] update us on how they have conducted their information dissemination for their landslide susceptibility map," said Zialcita.

On Saturday, an official of an environment protection group blamed the government for failing to take safety measures that could have prevented the landslide.

Clemente Bautista, national coordinator of Kalikasan-People's Network for the Environment, said the government had identified St. Bernard as a landslide-prone area in 2003.

He said the deaths could have been prevented, if not minimized, if the government had acted early enough by initiating a massive reforestation program and by setting up a locally based early warning system.

"There should be proper information dissemination of all matters pertaining to potential landslides and other disasters. A publication of all areas that are vulnerable to landslides should be the first step in educating and forewarning our people," Zialcita said.

Early warning

There are three things that local officials can do to prepare for a disaster, officials said.

One is to evacuate the residents to safer ground. Another is to apply an engineering solution to an impending disaster, such as the building of dikes. The third and cheapest way is to set up an early warning system, such as the one now in use in Aurora and Quezon provinces.

Cruz narrated how residents in flood-prone areas in Southern Luzon had placed posts that can measure the rise of water in a river.

Alert level 4, for example, would mean that the people need to leave their homes for higher ground.

"In Quezon, when (the water) reaches level 4, the mechanism (in place) is to ring the church bells. One person would ride a bike telling the people that the water is rising. There are many indigenous and creative ways (to set up) early warning devices," the defense secretary said.

The Citizens Disaster Response Center (CDRC) has urged the government to adopt concrete measures to address the causes of people's vulnerability to disasters.

CRDC advocacy officer Katharina Ann Berza said in a statement that an average of 317 disasters hits the country every year, affecting millions of Filipinos.

She noted a rising frequency in disasters during the last decade and a subsequent increase in the number of people affected. Last year, a total of 10.4 million people were affected by 440 disasters. Ten years ago, 408 disasters affected 9.9 million people.

"One would assume that given these disasters, a comprehensive disaster management system and program should have already been in place and a separate government body that gives special and undivided attention to the many tasks of disaster management formed," CRDC said.

Disappointingly, the CRDC observed, the disaster response system in the country was reactive, emergency-focused and relief-centered.

The group noted that while the government was allotting more than 30 percent of its annual budget to foreign debt servicing, it was setting aside a measly 0.1 percent for calamity funds.

For his part, Von Hernandez, campaigns director of Greenpeace Southeast Asia, urged the government to prepare for the consequences of logging and climate change.

"There had been warnings that the combined threats of destructive logging and an increase in extreme weather events caused by climate change would intensify the impact of disasters," Hernandez said in another statement. With reports from Michael Lim Ubac and Delfin T. Mallari Jr., PDI Southern Luzon Bureau